Online photo blogs and posting

[JPatrosso]

I just got back into this great hobby and am interested in posting my photos online in almost a blog fashion while I learn more about the camera and sharpen my skills.

What Im looking for is a site that allows a large quantity of photos to be shown with the option of locking them from others being able to personally extract the photos. Free would be a big bonus too!

Any suggestions?

[mimiya]

well...there's flickr.com

[JPatrosso]

I have been checking that site out as well as 23hq. I see that is what you are using. How do you like it?

[mimiya]

I really like it! It goes way beyond just storage for your photos. If you at some time DO want to share your photos - there are literally thousands of 'groups' that you can join according to your interests - such as the type of camera or lens you like to use or the type of processing you like to do on your photos or photoshop groups, or scrapbooking groups - the list is quite endless.

I normally leave all my photos public so anyone can see and comment on them. I do keep some family sets private and then just invite whomever I want to view it. You can group your photos together in all kinds of way as well.

I've also got some photos at smugmug.com but it is not a free account. My flickr account is free and that is for uploading up to 100mb per month. I don't ever upload that much so it works for me. Even so, for unlimited uploading it's only around $25 per year for a pro account.

I know a lot of people on this board use flickr - that's what got me started looking at it in the first place.

[FrankLamont]

SmugMug is not free, but it is entirely customisable and has unlimited storage. Options of locking, password locking, different galleries, etc. make it very appealing.

[henryscat]

Hi there,
I combine Flickr with a Worpress site for my photos.

Flickr is more of a hosting community for me and I use the wordpress site to tell a wee story about my trips.

Flickr: HenrysCat's Photostream
The PK Perspective - Central Scotland Bloggers

You can get a worpress site completely free but it is limited to the plugins they provide you. I personally found it too limiting so have gone with hosting from Godaddy.com and installed the full (free) wordpress site there.

The beauty of it is you don't need any programming or design knowledge as the design templates and plugins are mostly free.

[JPatrosso]

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! Im thinking I may do a combo between flickr and blogspot. Down the road, I may tx over to SmugMug, but free is a GREAT thing right now.

Really enjoying this site!